2 ms·
There's invasive species that are hugely problematic, converting whole forests from fungal decomposition of leaves to bacterial (changing the soil conditions qu
by maxerickson 1y ago
There's invasive species that are hugely problematic, converting whole forests from fungal decomposition of leaves to bacterial (changing the soil conditions quite a lot).
- mapt 1y agoI've read this, but I'm not 100% clear on this. I think it's probably entangled with the glaciation / interglacial transition, which happened relatively recently. Earthworms are invasive in Michigan, but so are _trees_ in that timescale. It seems like having a foot thickness of forest duff decomposing slowly is probably not a very ecologically stable situation, and might be a temporary phase as the forests creep northwards and the temperatures creep up. Earthworms are not especially frost-hardy, and need to burrow deep enough to survive frost, which is physically difficult as you go farther north. Has a drastic change occurred in the forest floors of, say, temperate Georgia?
- maxerickson 1y agoI guess I don't care to understand your point. The earthworms I am talking about were introduced by modern fishermen and have reduced mushroom habitat.